First off, YAY ED!!! Ed Yong, of Not Exactly Rocket Science Fame, has won the Top Quark Prize for Science, given out by Three Quarks Daily. His post, on gut bacteria in Japanese people who love sushi, is truly really awesome. Kudos also to the winners of the Strange Quark and the Charm Quark! Well written all around!!!
And secondly, Sci got wind recently of something really cool brewing on the internets. This cool thing is a place called The Third Reviewer, which allows people to post comments on journal articles. Right now it’s only neuroscience (which is enough for Sci!!) but maybe if it gets popular it will expand. Sci thinks this is a brilliant idea. Right now, you can’t really comment on a lot of articles (unless the paper is in PLoS, and though PloS is great, it can’t publish everything). Most require you to send in a comment, written and cited, which then has to be reviewed and itself published. And mostly, that won’t happen at all. But this is commenting instantly, and ANONYMOUSLY.
Sci thinks this is brilliant. Of course you may get some quacks on there, but you will also get grad students and post-docs, stretching their wings in commenting on science, who will finally feel they can comment without putting their reputations in their field on the line. Sci knows that she and her professional cronies have discussed papers long and hard, and often had some pretty angry (or happy) opinions, but were afraid to say anything due to the huge effort and the possible blow to your reputation that can come from speaking your mind to the big dogs, and maybe, getting it wrong. So this looks like a great idea, and I hope it gains momentum. Check it out!
And now, back to your regular Tuesday.
